Antonio Vasquez

Working on my first wooden yard. So far so good. I’m wondering if I should try making some of the blocks that tie to the yard. I’m not crazy about the look of the plastic ones that came in the kit.

46 minutes ago, mtaylor said:

Will the masts be painted?   If so, for the rings, paper can be used.  If not, still paper but black as think those rings were usually metal.  The pieces in the center, use some scrap wood, thin wood.   Glue into place.

Yes they will be painted,  i’m currently waiting for some primer to come in the mail ,  i’m not sure I understand how to make the rings out of paper.

 I’m taking my first shot at making wooden yards to replace the plastic ones on my USS constitution model. My question is about the molded ring at the end of the yard as well as the two flat protrusions at the center. How are these usually made on a small yard?

Working on masts at the moment. I put wood inside the mast halves to make the mast less flexible. 

Bamboo skewers worked perfect. Thanks for the info. Definitely bookmarking the styrene site as well.

 This is one of the top part of the mast on my plastic USS constitution build.  As you can probably tell from the pictures it’s slightly warped and it is real flimsy. I’d like to make a new piece of wood or something else that would be straight and a little bit more stiffer.  Any suggestions as to the type of wood to use or an alternative would be greatly appreciated.  

I find doing rat lines very therapeutic. That’s just me.

Another great idea.

Good idea.

I haven’t had a chance to get back to this build. Trying to get over pneumonia right now.

 Thank you for all the advice , I decided to use jersey Frankie’s method and it works really great. Thanks Frankie

1 hour ago, JerseyCity Frankie said:

My advice is just use glue, no knot at all. Knots add bulk and stick out too far in many instances. Don’t get me wrong, I’m a certified knot nerd! I love knots. But sometimes they are too thick when tied on a model.

I may give that a try. 

4 hours ago, lmagna said:

Hi Antionio

You can give this a try.

 I tried that when I did the front rails ,the problem that I had with that knot was it would cinch down on the post before I could pull the slack up from the previous post.

I am working on the railings on my Constitution. I am not very happy with the look of the rope rails.  If you’ll notice as the rope goes around the post it is higher as it leaves the post than on the other side.  I tried using an overhead not put the ropes still do not look even as they passed through the post. This creates a stepped look as I progress.Is there a way to secure the lines to the post and have them look even?Is there a way to secure the lines to the post and have them look even?

Are used some diluted Elmers glue to do some of my hand rail lines and it seem to work out pretty well. It was a lot slower than using the CA glue and I had to use a hair dryer to keep the knots from coming unraveled. But Elmers glue is cheap. Thanks for all the feedback everybody.

 One of the reasons why The CA glue was a little difficult to work with was when I used my needle to apply it it would dry between the prongs of my needle. I would have to use a razor or my wire wheel on my grinder to clean up the needle.  It never occurred to me to burn it off. I really love this place. A lot of the ideas I get here make my life a whole lot easier .

I’ll give the water , white glue a shot again. 

1 hour ago, lmagna said:

Dave

I LOVE that dispenser! Only seems like it is available in Australia though. I do the same thing with the bottles I buy but this seems kike it would work so much easier. 

They have those dispensers here too. Loctite has their CA in them. I tried it but did not get much use out of the bottle.

24 minutes ago, lmagna said:

I am no expert but I would think that you would want to tie first, and glue second, unless you are using a slow setting glue which CA is not in most cases. If you are trying to tie a stiff line then it will be much harder to get a tight knot.

 

Also, even though I am not sure about where you are, I buy tips that have small tubes that slip over the tip of the bottles I buy and when they become clogged just throw them away.

 

Someone else on the forum stated that they soak their tips in acetone or something like that to keep them clean and clear. Not sure where that post is or if Acetone was the solution used. 

 For a while there I was removing the tips off of the tubes and soaking them in nail polish remover. That deer remove the crusty glue that was on them however they plugged up really fast after I did that.

 When I watch some of the YouTube videos of people doing the rigging are usually see them using a drop of CA glue them a knot.Should I be doing something different?

I have been wondering what type of superglue is everybody uses around here. Our use the mostly for securing knots so that they don’t come undone done.  I have tried using diluted white glue to secure the knot  but I have had some knots Unwrap when that was used.

 My problem is it repeatedly opening and closing the CA glue the Gets gummed up and after a while I have a hard time closing It.  I purchased a couple small tubes of CA glue and put them in the very small dropper bottle so that I could unscrew the top and use my needle applicator to put a drop of glue on my knots.This worked fine for a while until my glue started to get very syrupy. I’d like to be able to apply very small amounts at a time and not have to constantly be buying new containers of glue because the old ones just get too difficult to open the container. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks, I figured the blade was hard already so I never let it get hot when I was grinding. I would grind for about a second and a half and the quench. If the steel doesn’t hold up well I have some old files and a leaf spring I could mess with.

 I wanted to make a marking knife for doing woodworking.  I figured it would come in handy for working on my models as well. The blade is a broken bi-metal blade off of an old sawzall.  I made the handle of some scrap oak that I had in the garage.  It’s good and sharp right now, let’s see how well the blade Holds up.

On 5/13/2018 at 3:35 PM, DCooper said:

Looks mighty fine.  A great improvement over trying to cobble together the broken kit parts.  Did you think to score a deep groove lengthwise down the top rails so you could use a very dark paint wash to fake the separation?  This structure will be much stronger than the kits parts that is for sure.

 

I hope you are on the mend and feeling better.  

 

All my best wishes.

 

Dan

Damn, I didn’t think of that!  I tried to split those 4 mm strips down the middle and I couldn’t get anything of consistent width.

 I tried to cut some wooden ones on my table saw and came out even worse. I’m curious as to why there are two rails on top, the posts are set apart very narrowly and it doesn’t look like there would be space in there for the human body. Can anybody elaborate on why those rails are set up differently than the ones at the front or the back of the ship?